It's WINTER-EEN-MAS everybody!

Yes, it's this time of year again: Yesterday began the season of Winter-Een-Mas. For those of you who don't know what that is, it's the annual holiday for gamers - by gamers! In fact, its inventor is avid gamer Tim Buckley who first let it take place on his webcomic Ctrl+Alt+Del in 2003 and increased its impact, popularity and significance among gamers by including epic story arcs about it throughout the years (see here for the respective strips).

The season starts on January 25th and ends on January 31st. So what can you do?

Besides wearing a sweet WEM shirt such as this. Hell yeah.

Why, play, of course!

To please the Gods of Gaming, you can choose a game of your liking and dedicate your time with it to them. Why not pick up an old game you used to play and refresh your memories?
Or take that old console out of your basement and dust it off!
Take some friends and have a go or two at some multiplayer classics!
Or just play your very favourite game in the Gaming Gods' name!

Two years ago I held a big Winter-Een-Mas party at my place over a whole weekend. Friday night people came over with their computers, and we hooked them up and did some LAN gaming. The next day even more people came and stayed all through Sunday, but Saturday was the most epic day:
I placed all my consoles in my bedroom and borrowed some fine multiplayer games (like Guitar Hero), and other people brought along some consoles as well - in the end we had an X-Box, a PS2, a Super Nintendo, a Sega Genesis, a Dreamcast and a Gamecube, all hooked up onto two TVs.
The kitchen was were we played tabletops, card games and everything not electronic (I think we even had action figures), and when B. showed everyone how 1000 Blank White Cards works, the room was buzzin.

Sadly, noone ever made pictures and I was too busy playing to do it myself, so my awesome selfmade Winter-Een-Mas crown will never be seen by the people.

But my, what a mighty sweet t-shirt that is.

So, people on Earth - I call upon you to play! Have fun just for the sake of it! Let go of your everyday trouble and play whatever you like, even if it's just a round of Solitaire or  a round of cards with someone -

to you who shall indulge themselves in the pleasure of the game, the Gods Of Gaming will be gratious and gracious.